Cub Raising Association

Figuring out golden finger

This situation was really too unexpected...

Many thoughts were rushing through Xie Tao’s head and he had no time to sort them out, after all, there was a person in front of him that needed his attention.

Seeing that he had finally woken up, Lu Yuan was so relived that he recovered his usual style of speech. “Thank you, Lazy[1], you frightened me!”

“When I came to see you, I found you unconscious and the yard was so messy... Did you get robbed?” That he came to this assumption was not surprising. All the pots were broken and Xie Tao had been laying unmoving on the ground... There was even a deep hole not far from him... It was not hard to guess what Lu Yuan’s first thought was...

When he had first walked into the yard, he had almost fully panicked and immediately taken out his mobile in order to call the police. However, he had resisted the impulse and instead run to first check on him and see if he was still alive.

Last night, Lu Yuan had, as promised, taken a few pictures of the meteor and sent it to the Xie Tao. After getting home and looking them over, he had suddenly felt like developing the photos, and today he had come in order to show them to Xie Tao.

He had a key to Xie Tao’s house, so he had opened the door directly. The reason for the key was very simple. Just as Xie Tao was sometimes too lazy to be angry and argue with others, he was also too lazy to want to open the door for him. With how often Lu Yuan came over, Xie Tao had eventually just given him his spare key.

“Nothing happened, a meteor just smashed into my backyard. When I came out to clean up the yard, I got too tired, so I laid down on the ground and fell asleep.” Xie Tao couldn’t exactly say that he had traveled to another world and taken care of alien cubs.. Even if he would try to explain it, it would be too complicated. He therefore replied with a half-truth joke.

Lu Yuan had been really worried about Xie Tao, but seeing that he could still make fun of him. Lu Yuan determined that he really was okey. He was relieved. “I was worried about you, really worried, even more than when my authors aren’t writing.. and this story, what you told me....”

As a Jinjiang editor, Lu Yuan believed that his psychological endurance was still relatively large.

(T/N: He have to endure procrastinating authors.... Yeah, I can see why he has the “I have been through war”- tone.. )

Lu Yuan certainly didn’t believe that a meteor actually hit the yard since no neighbors had been alarmed by the sound. As for this pit... Xie Tao might have dug it himself, although he didn’t see any tools around but neither did he see the supposed meteor, just an empty pit.

He didn’t know how the potted plants fell, but looking at the relaxed young man who looked quite decent, he did not seem to have experienced any danger last night.

Out of the whole story, Lu Yuan only felt that there was a certain degree of credibility in: “I got too tired, so I laid down on the ground and fell asleep”. But thinking about it, it was really a bit ridiculous.

However since Xie Tao didn’t want to tell him, he didn’t intend to pursue the truth. Lu Yuan therefore changed the topic. “..whatever, it doesn’t matter. By the way, my mother wanted me to ask how you were doing.“

Bringing up this matter, Lu Yuan couldn’t help the twitch of his eye.

His mother was a good friend with Xie Tao’s mother and they had stayed in contact for more than 30 years. Even though they no longer lived near each other, they would still call every few day to hear about the other’s life and ask about how they were doing. It really showed how good their relationship was.

Originally, both of their families lived in the outer edge of the capital. The two families were not too far apart and under the influence of their parents, he and Xie Tao became childhood friends.

Since his mother, against his will, had taken him to Xie Tao’s house several times, Lu Yuan had felt that he had changed from a valuable son to a slave.

His family was a model of a strict father and a mother. In Lu Yuan’s eyes, his mother was much stricter than the school principal. But when facing Xie Tao, his mother somehow became the gentle mother of Lu Yuan’s childhood dreams.

Especially after Xie Tao’s parents moved to another province for work reasons, and Xie Tao was left alone to continue studying the capital. Lu Yuan’s mother had been even more concerned about Xie Tao. She often told Lu Yuan that it was important that he made sure to help the other and take care of him, Lu Yuan therefore often stayed at home during the holidays and visited him.

In the beginning, Lu Yuan had envied and hated him. However, although he didn’t know exactly when, but somewhere during these years of constant contact he had stopped hating him and instead grown fond of him, basically seeing him as a younger brother.

“En, when you go home, thank aunt Lin for me and tell her that I wish that she is well.” Xie Tao was very grateful to Lu Yuan’s family. Although he had no difficulty in living alone, there are no other people around him that seem to care so much about him as they did. They therefore were a very special existence for him.

Lu Yuan nodded, and then put a bag in the hands of Xie Tao, “The photos taken last night, I developed them.”

Lu Yuan turned around and took a step away but then stopped and turned back.

“If you live alone, you should be more careful, don’t make me worry all the time.” Lu Yuan had unconsciously repeated his mother nagging without knowing. “I still have something to do, I have to go, so in short, don’t mess around.”

Xie Tao nodded however Lu Yuan still stood there with a concerned look. Ultimately he had to repeatedly guarantee and promise to be good, before Lu Yuan felt satisfied enough to leave.

Xie Tao gave a small helpless laughed as he watched Lu Yuan’s back leave, the then became serious as he turned around and faced his own messy yard.

“Hm..”

He fell into thoughts.

First of all, Xie Tao did not think that what he had experienced before was just a dream. This was because his whole yard was basically proof that it happened. But somehow the loud bang and the vibrations from the meteor’s impact did not seem to have reached his neighbors.

The loud noise at that time had made Xie Tao feel like his ears would be permanently damaged and if there suddenly was such a loud bang in the residential area, as well as the violent vibrations. News about the event would obviously spread fast however, from the reaction of Lu Yuan, it seemed that the outside was calm.

This meant that...?

Xie Tao thought about the crash and could only come up with one possibility, the golden ball of light must have set up some sort of barrier to shield the outside from what was happening inside, and at the same time shield the inside from any disturbances.

At this point, his mind was already rushed with hundreds of speculations. But knowing that the chaos wouldn’t get him anything, he calmed himself down and instead focused on the two important point that he knew was real, he then built from there.

1. Just create a link

This “link” should refer to a link between the two worlds. Thinking back to what happened when he connected last time, Xie Tao temporarily associated it with dreaming.

Basically, Xie Tao believed that if he was to go to sleep now, he would be able to connect and wake up in the other world.

2. It will not have much impact on your real life

When thinking about this sentence, Xie Tao felt inside his pant’s pocket, and the milk candy he had fed to the Muka cub was still inside.

This was very interesting. He did succeed in bringing the candy to the other world and he did feed it to the Muka cub. However when he returned to his original world, the milk candy was still in his pocket.

He felt his shirt pocket. The spar that the mermaid cub gave him was not there, it had not been brought back to his world.

If marking the other world as A, Xie Tao came to some conclusions.

Rule 1: He seemed to be able to bring things from this world to world A, but not vice versa.

Rule 2: The things that he brought to world A would still continue to exist in the original world even if they were consumed.

Finding out these things was a big deal, however he still felt a bit frustrated. There must be more supplementary rules that he didn’t know.

Xie Tao turned towards his house.

His theories needed to be tested, but before that he went back to his room in order to wash up and get all grass off of him.

Done showering, he blowed dried his hair and walked into his room.

Feeling refreshed, he gave a small sigh of content, he then took a book and held it in his arms as he lied down, the milk candy was still in is pocket and he was ready to test his theories. He closed his eyes.

Theoretically he shouldn’t have been able to fall asleep any time soon, after all, he had just slept and felt energetic, however just as the thought of wanting to sleep crossed his mind, Xie Tao’s conscious faded.

When Xie Tao opened his eyes again, he was met with the sight of an old ceiling, the white color was different from the one in his home as it had yellowed a bit from many years passage. He looked around. Four plain wall, a mattress and a rough quilt. In addition to the quilt covering his body, Xie Tao clearly felt that he still had a weight on his body.

Opening the quilt, Xie Tao saw the book he was sleeping with in the original world. Very good, the rule was confirmed.

Xie Tao patted the outside of his pant’s pocket, this time he could not feel the milk candy. He was not too surprised and soon noted down a supplementary rule.

Rule 3: The same item cannot be repeatedly carried to world A.

Dragging his fingers across the book in his hand, Xie Tao realized that Xia Zuo, the golden light ball floating around him, was actually quite powerful.

This book, strictly speaking, was not what he brought from his world. If it was brought, then the items in his world, like for example the milk candy, should have disappeared, but it hadn’t. Therefore a copy, an exact copy, must have been materialize whenever he travel here.

From the perspective of materialism, this couldn’t be explained. Xie Tao can only partially comprehend it and he felt that this world must somehow believe that this book exists and therefor it appeared.

The reason why the world thought that this book existed was probably because the “link” Xie Tao had created, this “link” somehow deceived the rules of the world, which was undoubtedly an unimaginable power ability.

Xie Tao couldn’t help but to think about the fact that even though the other party had such a powerful ability, he still couldn’t save the world from being destroyed in the future and asked for his help.

But what could he do?

To save the world, such a high level mission, if the other side as a boss-level figure with high combat power couldn’t do it, how could he, a low level beginner do it...

“Ah, stop it.” Xie Tao raised his hand and patted his cheek, clearing his mind of all unnecessary thoughts.

The world will be destroyed in the future, as for how long until it happens and for what reason, Xie Tao did not know, it could be in a thousand years, it would be tomorrow.

But compared to thinking about this kind of thing that was impossible to answer, Xie Tao felt that he should find a clear meaningful goal that was more reachable.

After all, he had a great golden finger at his disposal, the ability to bring the things on earth to this world, it really was an amazing cheat!

Since there was such an ability, as long as he understood the trade of this world, he could probably make money to improve all aspects of their Cub Raising Association!

He would be able to buy better rations for the cubs in the club, buy softer and more comfortable beds, maybe they could even get the club’s facade fixed up or at least change the rusty gate to make the place look more respectable from the outside.

This was much more meaningful than stressing about “saving the world”, something he clearly couldn’t do, at least not at the moment.

Thinking out a plan, Xie Tao got up and left the room.

He had to look for Xia Qi in order to inquire about the trade situation of this planet and see how to use his golden finger to earn himself a bucket of gold.

__________

The author has something to say:

Daisy, Xie Tao is very prepared to start making money =3=

__________________

Translator’s note:

Lu Yuan has a nickname for him (see footnote) do you want me to continue using the sarcastic meaning or should I write “Xie Lánlán” In the text or should I modify the nickname to something like “Xie Tata” or “Xie Taotao” or “Xie Tatao”?

[1] – Lu Yuan is addressing him with his nickname which is “Xie Lánlán”, “Lán” means lazy in Chinese and “Xie” can mean the following: To thank, to apologize, to wither (plants) or to decline. So whenever Yu Luan says this sentence it can also hold a sarcastic meaning.